Reviews

Although we mainly focus on reviews of movies and TV or streaming series, we have a wide array of reviews here at Cosmic Circus. This includes concerts, tech and other products, travel, games, books, and comics.

Refer to the Stellar Picks archive to find some of our top-rated movies, shows, books, games, and more!


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‘Trap’ Movie Is M. Night Shyamalan at His Most Personal and Cynical

It’s incredible how much my opinion of M. Night Shyamalan shifted almost overnight after sitting in front of his 2019 masterpiece, Glass. Before, I thought the same thing as everyone else: great first few movies, but his current output has been lacking. I’m not ready to say that The Last Airbender and After Earth are masterpieces, far from it. However, something

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Fantasia Fest 2024 Review: ‘The Beast Within’, A Gothic Tale of Childhood Trauma

Fantasia Fest brought an unusual horror movie that touches on childhood trauma. The Beast Within brings back the old-school flavor of Hammer monster movies, where everything has a Gothic sensibility and an evocative story. The Beast Within deals with the confusion of growing up in a toxic environment. More specifically, how the brain attempts to cope with said environments; being young,

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‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2: Epic Beginning But Faulty Ending

After only eight weeks, the finale for House of the Dragon season 2 has aired and the expected two-year wait for the third season has begun. It was announced, long before the second season premiered, that the series would be shortening the season length to only eight episodes, something that was found to be controversial among the fan base. Many fans

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‘Perihelion’ by Claudia Gray (An X-Files Novel) Book Review

Mulder and Scully have gone civilian. Officially suspended from the FBI pending a review, they’re trying to adjust to life outside the X-files. And it’s a big adjustment, especially since Scully is pregnant with Mulder’s baby (hopefully)! But you can’t touch the unexplained for as long as these two have and expect it to just let you go. The FBI wants

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Fantasia Fest 2024 Review: ‘Baby Assassins: Nice Days’ Is One of the Best Action Movies Ever Made

No hyperbole. You read this correctly. Yugo Sakamoto has pulled off one of the greatest action movies my eyes have ever witnessed in Baby Assassins: Nice Days, which had its Canadian premiere at the Fantasia International Film Festival. The sequel to Baby Assassins 2, which vastly improved upon the 2022 microbudget first installment that had two amazing action sequences and not

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Fantasia Fest 2024 Review: Exciting Action Doesn’t Quite Save ‘Out of the Shadow’

Competing for the Cheval Noir Award at the Fantasia International Film Festival, Ricky Ko’s Out of the Shadow has all the right ingredients for a fun time at the movies: a coming-of-age tale for a teenaged protagonist who learns to trust herself through fighting, intricately staged and choreographed Karate battles, and religious symbolism that will guide the journey each protagonist will

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Fantasia Fest 2024 Review: ‘Tatsumi’ is an Unimpressive Mob Thriller

With the Fantasia International Festival well underway, there are plenty of movies to still enjoy and appreciate in the Hall and J.A. de Sève auditoriums at Concordia University. A movie that sounded interesting on paper to me was Hiroshi Shoji’s Tatsumi, a mob drama that centers on its titular character (Yuya Endo) seeking revenge on the people who murdered his ex-girlfriend,

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Exploring the Legacy of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine

Wolverine is one of the most recognizable mutants in the Marvel Universe. He appeared in every mutant show and most movies about mutants. His popularity is huge thanks to the X-Men: The Animated Series and Hugh Jackman’s live-action adaptation of the character. With Deadpool & Wolverine now in theaters, and the huge comeback of Jackman to the role, let’s do a

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Fantasia Fest 2024 Review: ‘Penalty Loop’ Reinvents Time loop Cinema

Before Shinji Araki’s Penalty Loop played in front of a sold-out crowd at the Fantasia International Film Festival, audiences were treated to the classic advertisement for Nongshim noodles not once but twice. At first, I didn’t grasp why this happened (although the real ones know the ad played an endless number of times in front of Park Chan-wook’s Oldboy last year).

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‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Discussion (Cosmic Circle Ep. 59)

We’ve made it through the drought, friends! It’s been so long since we’ve had a Marvel Studios film in theaters, with the last entry being The Marvels back in November. Partially due to the strikes and a righting of the ship over at the Disney-owned company, it’s taken a while for a new MCU film to arrive. But the wait is

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‘Batman: Caped Crusader’ is A Fresh Take on The Dark Knight

This week the release of Batman: Caped Crusader hits Prime Video after surviving cost-cutting moves by Warner Brothers. Indeed it had involvement from some big names with experience in Batman and beyond, Matt Reeves, Bruce Timm, and JJ Abrams. A new take with some old charm, Batman: Caped Crusader has a much less experienced Batman, voiced by Hamish Linklater. Many changes

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‘The Shadow on the Glass’ by Jonathan L Howard (Call of Cthulhu series) Book Review

Lizzie and Bill have a pretty good thing going in Victorian London. Taking advantage of the spiritualist craze that’s sweeping society, Lizzie adopts the persona of Cerulia Trent, a medium that can connect people to their dearly departed loved ones. In a wise con, they never ask for money, but people are so grateful for their services that they shower them

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